Louisville, KY

January 2014

Jonathan Exum got his start cooking professionally at 16 when he moved quickly from dish water to fry cook and on up the line to grill cook. But he first started cooking the second his farther handed him a pair of tongs when he was a kid. He went to school to study computers, but after some second thoughts, decided to enroll at the Culinary Institute of America.

Before becoming chef at Wiltshire on Market—a restaurant that is part of the very fabricate of the Louisville dining scene—Exum worked under regional powerhouse and Chef Michael Paley. Exum reinvents Kentucky classics, as with his Watergate Salad, and breathes new life into simple Southern staples as with his double smoke ham dip. The recipe and technique for the ham dip was inspired by his father. Exum has recently begun a side business, selling double smoked hams.